


Hospitality

by unwindmyself



Series: curious shapes shift in the dark [29]
Category: True Blood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dress Up, Female Friendship, Fix-It, Gen, Male-Female Friendship, Research, Vampire Family, agency and choices!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-22
Updated: 2014-02-22
Packaged: 2018-01-13 09:29:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1221208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unwindmyself/pseuds/unwindmyself
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Not to be outdone, Pam and Nora prepare to go investigating in Pam's social circles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hospitality

**Author's Note:**

> Part two, "Waiting for the Kill."

“Well,” Eric halfway-laughs when he lets himself into Pam’s room. This time she’s got Nora seated at her dressing table, and for the second time in as many nights his sister is (this time rather sullenly) letting her hair be played with.

Unlike was the case with the babies, this is actually an attempt at fanciness, not familiarity. This is dressing up to meet Pam’s friends’ high, exotic, obscure standards: he’s taking staying-in duty tonight, and not to be left out while the babies go off adventuring, Pam and Nora are going to go grill some of the other vampires that Pam’s become acquainted with over the years. Now that they know that there’s this whole government-sponsored vamp camp, they have something specific to inquire about. And they might be able to find out the street buzz about Billith’s gang, too.

The thing is, though, that the best way to do this is by meeting them at their club. It’s not a Fangtasia-style human-oriented bar; they call it a speakeasy (“I suppose that would account for why I’ve never heard it existed until now,” Nora muttered) and the only humans who get invited are snacks. This is another reason Eric’s staying in and Nora’s going: in addition to “speakeasy,” the other title it’s earned itself is “gentlewoman’s club,” no boys allowed, not out of any hatred or disdain but mostly because it amuses the women who run it. It’s not dress-coded, but a certain measure of fancying up is advised. Which leads them to this moment.

"Shut up," Nora exclaims, glaring at her brother.  She'll play along with this because she's got to, but this is hardly her style - the heavy, sirenlike thing, that is, over time she's been straightforward and she's been ethereal and she's been businesslike and she's been glamorous, but this?  Hell, no - and what's more, she still isn't sure she won't get made up ridiculously just out of Pam's potentially deranged sense of humor.

"I think it's nice," Eric says.  "It's been a century since I saw you all dolled up like this."

Well, the fairytale gowns she tended to at the Authority were fancy, but she still wore them as _her_ as she could, nothing but a touch of eyeliner for makeup and her feet bare.

"Don't be absurd," she retorts.  "That gala in the fifties?" After all, in her mind at least he is notoriously awful at keeping track of dates.

He shrugs sheepishly.  "Whatever the case, it looks like you'll fit in just fine with Pam's friends," he observes.

"Oh, yeah," Pam drawls.  "Good thing she's one of us, if she walked in looking like this as a human they'd eat her right up."

"Sitting right here," Nora points out petulantly.

"Relax, Auntie," Pam croons.  "It's a compliment."

"And if you want to pay it, pay it to me directly," Nora snaps.  "Not this third person bullshit."

Pam looks almost accusingly at Eric, but he just shrugs again.  _Play nice._   He knows that's a pet peeve or Nora's, and he mostly understands why.

"Fine," Pam sighs.  "Hair's done."

Nora had been wary when the curling iron came out (she hasn't curled her hair more than at the ends for she doesn't know how long) but it's all pinned up now, which she can live with.  She mumbles as much and Eric nods approvingly, which of course makes her roll her eyes.

"Now, corset," Pam declares.

"Must we?" Nora grumbles. “You’re just wearing a dress.” Indeed, Pam’s already got herself all dressed – she had before she even came to pester Nora about it – in this blue silk-satin-looking sleeveless number with earrings and bracelet to match, what look to be Louboutins (she hasn’t asked) on her feet.

"Indulge me?" Pam whines, fluttering her eyelashes in such a way that Nora will look a bully for refusing.

Nora groans (this is another thing she hasn’t done in ages, not since it was an everyday inevitability) but Eric is looking at her so archly, _Don’t disappoint the child_ , and Pam is no baby but she’s still a child compared to Eric and Nora, of course it’s Nora’s to be mature about this. So off comes the dressing gown Pam had lent her and there she stands almost stubbornly, hands on her hips, naked save her hipster-cut panties (black lace, of course).

Of course Eric knows Nora’s naked body as well as he does his own, but Pam takes a second to raise an eyebrow appreciatively. “I get it,” she declares, but before Nora can accuse her of third-personing her again, she clarifies, almost gently, “I get what Eric sees in you.” At least physically, she means. There’s no weak link in their family when it comes to being completely hot (even Willa is, in a kind of teenybopper way).

Nora rolls her eyes, but she smiles almost tiredly. “Thank you,” she murmurs. “Eric, skirt? It’s over on the bed.”

“And here I was hoping you were just going to go out in those and the corset like you’re in some sexually charged floorshow,” he teases, but he moves away for the skirt before she can smack him like he knows she’s going to try to do. It’s purple and black (of course it is), a sort of quasi-Victorian wallpaper sort of pattern to it, and Nora’s quick to shimmy into it.

Pam’s behind her with the corset in a flash, placing it around Nora’s waist and doing the front hooks speedily, arranging the lapels on it (of course she had to go and pick the one that she had the least chance of falling out the top of, the one built like a suit vest) and hooking them together behind her neck. “Steady yourself, sweetie,” Pam says. “I lace tight.”

“I can take it,” Nora snaps, though she motions Eric around front of her so she can grab his hands for balance just in case.

It’s a smart enough choice, as Pam wasn’t kidding; she pulls at the laces of the corset aggressively, nipping Nora’s waist in dramatically as she does. It doesn’t hurt, it’s actually sort of nice (Pam’s tempted to make some crack about the noise it elicits from Nora, how that’s a pretty good clue to something else – a probable masochistic streak – that Eric might like about her, but she refrains), but the force of the movement would be enough to start Nora swaying if Eric weren’t there keeping her still.

She reaches for her fingerless leather gloves once it’s on, sighing as she adjusts to the feeling after all this time, but she needs Eric’s help to put her boots on, given the way the corset keeps her from properly bending; it’s poor planning, she should have thought of it, but at the same time making Eric wait on her is sort of her revenge for getting sent on the fancy-dress mission with the niece she’s still never had a civil conversation with.

 

* * *

 

Several hours, a great deal of talking, and some very welcome drinks later (Nora, who’s been trying her very hardest to content herself with synthetic blood, has to admit that provided the humans are willing – and the ones here are – they’re always going to be a more refreshing option; Pam’s just glad to have something fresh that doesn’t smell like its bottle) the two women emerge from the speakeasy, sated.

“Sure you got enough notes, Auntie?” Pam asks dryly, watching Nora folding up the cocktail napkins she scribbled on and stuffing them between her corset and her skin.

“I don’t think it’s nearly enough information to go off of by itself,” Nora mutters, “but I wrote down everything they said. They were quite helpful, our hosts.”

“Yeah, sometimes you run across a few good characters in the underworld,” Pam agrees. “And when they’re not having to play informant regarding the impending apocalypse, they’re all pretty good lays. Especially Ghaliya.” The oldest of the group, an absolutely breathtaking Tunisian woman, who Pam makes a point to mention given that she’d been eyeing Nora even more obviously than the rest of them.

“Well,” Nora says, because, well, she’d been eying her right back. This is so far from the time to be thinking about that, though. “In any case, we’ve got more information than we had when we set out. Between this and what the girls bring back, we ought to have enough to start formulating a proper plan.”

Pam nods, but because she’s herself she can’t help but muse, “Ought to isn’t going to.”

“No,” Nora admits. “But it’s something.”

“So we take it back to Daddy, then once the little ones have returned we crowd around the table and make war maps?” Pam asks, in that could-be-sarcastic, could-be-serious tone of hers.

“Yes,” Nora agrees. It’s easier for her if she just assumes it’s serious and deals with it so. “Or perhaps not maps, but plans of some kind. We wouldn’t want to go into this without any idea what we were doing.”

“Of course not,” Pam replies, nodding very seriously (which of course means she’s being at least partially sarcastic). “You must have done a lot of that before. Making plans.”

Before, with the Authority. Nora understands. And she understands the unspoken judgment in Pam’s voice. “It does rather come with the territory of supervising an entire species,” she points out. “You wouldn’t want to fly into it all – haphazard.”

“Of course not,” Pam repeats. “Like y’all did with this Lilith stuff.”

“Yes and no,” Nora mutters. “We’d planned up to a point, but this resurrection business – well.” She sighs. “I’ll still need to do more research before I know quite what to do with that.”

“Because that goes with the planning,” Pam declares. “Right.”

“You know, it’s not as hopelessly square as you seem to think,” Nora says, an almost playful edge creeping into her voice. “Research can be fun. Tonight was research.”

“Tonight was a social call,” Pam corrects.

“Where we did research,” Nora points out, enjoying the rather horrified look that flashes across Pam’s face for a moment. They walk along in silence for a few minutes before she adds, “What you said before, about what Eric sees in me? I think I’ve figured out the same for you.”

Talking about feelings is one of Pam’s least favorite things, so her response is a droll, “Yeah, I know I clean up pretty nice.”

“Not like that,” Nora retorts. “I mean, he’s proud of you, he always has been. How you handle yourself, who you’ve turned out to be. I see why.”

Pam arches an eyebrow. “Always,” she repeats.

“Yes,” Nora says. “Since he made you. You couldn’t know about me, for your own safety, but I knew all about you. He loves you.”

Pam’s tempted to ask if she was giving off some sort of needy child vibe, but it occurs to her (it occurred to Nora too) that this conversation isn’t a complete trainwreck, and maybe that’s worth preserving. Keeping the peace for family’s sake.


End file.
